HOW LONG AND HOW OFTEN SHOULD YOU ICE BATHE?
The water has turned cold again, and they’re back in it in droves. What goes through your mind when you pass cold bathers? Do you shake your head and long for the good old days, when ducks were given a winter break? Or do you admire their apparent fearlessness?
Are you someone who occasionally steps into cold water yourself? Maybe ice bathing has already become part of your everyday life. But even if you haven’t had much to do with it so far, the answer to the very same question I’m asked at every ice-bathing workshop, might still interest you:
How much cold is good for us?
My answer is: you have to find out for yourself. Not very satisfying — I know. That’s why I usually add this: there is no study on cold therapy showing that staying longer than two to three minutes in an ice bath provides additional benefits. The key hormonal and metabolic effects will have occurred by then. If we force ourselves to stay in cold water for longer, we risk putting unnecessary stress on the body. Hearing this tends to reassure the more cautious participants and disappoint the ambitious ones — because many come to the workshop expecting to learn how to endure the cold for as long as possible.
THE SØBERG PRINCIPLE
In addition to the duration of each ice bath, water and air temperature — as well as how often we bathe — naturally play an important role. If we follow the Søberg Principle, named after metabolic researcher Dr. Susanna Søberg, an ideal weekly ice-bathing duration is around 11 minutes, divided into several sessions. This can serve as a guideline: if we stay in the ice bath for about three minutes each time, that would mean cold bathing three to four times per week. According to Søberg, this is sufficient to stimulate metabolism — for example activating brown fat cells with their warming and anti-inflammatory properties, or improving insulin sensitivity. Crazy isn’t it, that we are able to get such an effect in a completely natural way!?
THE PERFECT COLD DOSE – MY PRACTICAL EXPERIENCE
Over almost ten years as a Wim Hof Instructor, during which I’ve accompanied more than 1,000 people into cold water, one thing has become very clear to me: we all react differently to cold. Our bodies are built differently, we live differently — in terms of nutrition, sleep, and movement — and our hormones influence us in individual ways. Personally I doubt that capturing all of these factors in a single study, is possible. Additionally we know, that our physical response to stress depends on whether we feel threatened (distress) by the situation or positively challenged (eustress).
That is why I define the perfect cold dose as one that challenges our body without repeatedly overwhelming it. Do you feel cold for the rest of the day after your ice bath? Can you barely get warm again without a hot shower, thick layers of clothing, or a hot water bottle? Then cold plunging will probably bring only limited enjoyment. And it’s quite possible that it is weakening your body rather than strengthening it. In such cases, I recommend reducing the duration and/or frequency of your ice baths. There may also be room to optimise your rewarming habits. You’ll find a few tips on this in my blog “Cold bathing is easy — rewarming is the art.”
THE MINIMUM COLD DOSE
There exists also a recommended minimum duration for your ice bath: around two minutes. The body needs some time to adapt to the cold. It immediately reorganises blood circulation in order to protect our vital organs. If you get out before establishes its balance, you miss the more pleasant part.
If you’re starting out on your own without guidance, you might not manage two minutes right away — and that’s perfectly fine. Simply focus on exhaling slowly while in the water, and trust that with time and experience, it will become natural.
MORE FREEDOM IN EVERYDAY STRESS
For me, consciously accepting and living through that initial stress response — which usually subsides after about 30 to 60 seconds — is one of the most important aspects of ice bathing. This is where something essential happens: our breathing and nervous system learn to return to calm more quickly under stress.
With every ice bath, we gain a few extra milliseconds between a stress impulse and our reaction — and that carries over into everyday life. Or, as Viktor Frankl put it so beautifully: Between stimulus and response lies our freedom.
USING THE FULL POTENTIAL OF ICE BATHING
If you want to unlock the full potential of ice bathing, shift your focus away from duration and toward enjoyment and relaxation. The moment we try to prove our perseverance — to ourselves or to others — we miss a valuable opportunity to let go, to build trust, and to be fully present. Or, as I love to remember: there’s no happy end to an unhappy journey!
That’s exactly where I place the emphasis in my cold & breath workshops and trainings — so that ice bathing doesn’t become just another task to be accomplished, but a conscious moment of just being , a small and healthy adventure with a spark of boldness.
You can find more on this topic in my radio interview on SRF Kultur or TV-interview on Telebielingue.